


Wednesdays, or Close To It

by capalxii



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Truckers, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-11
Updated: 2015-01-11
Packaged: 2018-03-07 02:31:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3157853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/capalxii/pseuds/capalxii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Clara didn't miss things. She'd given up missing things as a teenager, there was no point, missing things or people never brought them back, the energy was better spent elsewhere. And so it had surprised her when, in the silence of her cab, she'd found herself actually missing his voice." AU where they're both truckers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wednesdays, or Close To It

**Author's Note:**

> Literally all I know about trucking is what I learned as I wrote this, and maybe some vestigial memories of Convoy and Smokey & the Bandit. Which is to say: I don't know much. I apologize to anyone who knows anything about driving trucks, though this is not really about that anyway. As to why they're in the US: I know US roads.

There's a counter in front of them, a small assembly of teenagers in a booth behind them, and something, some awkward strange silence between them, where every time Clara thinks he's looking at her she glances over to find him staring into his coffee, and every time she glances into her own tea she's sure he's stealing a look at her. 

She'd seen him before, but it had been weeks and thousands of miles between. She's seen plenty of others, talked to even more on CB, but she's sure she hasn't talked to him--that accent is a rarity here, or in Lansing, or Flagstaff, or Walcott or anywhere else she's been. "Coffee's good here," he says, by way of a hello.

"You'd like this place up 95 a little way," she says, and finally she does catch him looking. Her accent's a rarity, too, and she smirks a bit at him. "Long way from home."

"You're one to talk," he says. A smile's growing on his face; it's a face Clara could spend days looking at. He's got a map of the world on him, something deeper in his eyes that she wants to know about. "What brings you here?"

"Break," she says. "The last one I got, the unloading ate into my time, I don't think I got more than four hours to myself before I was on the road again. How about you?"

With a sympathetic grunt, he says, "It's a long story."

*

It is a long story, and one he's not interested in telling. The short version is he's ended up in America, and gets paid to do what he had been doing for years already: drifting from place to place, making as few connections as possible until he feels the need to pick up and go again, leaving before he can be left. If he has to carry things for others while moving, that's fine. The money's been decent, and when he gets tired he'll shed this skin and find himself somewhere else, just as he always has. 

But the woman beside him--he's curious about her. How she got to where she is. He hears her answer for what it is, a signal, something to let him know she's like him without sounding defensive. Looking as young and small as she does, she's probably needed to develop that skill, and plenty of others beyond; it's enough to tell him she loves the road as much as he does, maybe even more, if she's willing to hone whatever survival skills are necessary to stay on it. 

The coffee really is good. Unlike her, he'd only had a short amount of time, a half hour before he has to climb back into his truck and get back on the road, and he's already at the twenty minute mark. He can't get her story in that time and he's not sure it's his place to ask for it anyway, so he says, "I'm usually around here on a Wednesday."

"Where are you headed?"

"Chester, then Pittsburgh," he says. "You?"

"Elkton," she says, "after that, down to Newport News for a drop and hook to Greensboro."

They'll be putting hundreds of miles between each other. "I've seen you around before," he hedges. He hasn't, but it's likely she'd been to this stop previously, and a part of him he's never really understood hopes she'd find her way back.

"I try to make it here when I can. Showers are hot, food's good, they keep the telly in the diner on something decent." She stirs her tea idly and glances up at him, from the side of her eyes. "But you haven't seen me here before at all."

He's caught but he can't do anything but laugh. "Yeah, okay. Maybe I just wish it." Looking at her fully, he takes her in, almost cataloging her just in case. Silky brown hair cut shoulder length, big round eyes in a big round face, a surface sweetness hiding something sharp and maybe exquisitely bitter. He holds out his hand. "John Smith." 

She looks as though she wants to ask if that's real and he sighs and grimaces and she laughs a bit before taking his hand and saying, "Clara Oswald. You said Wednesdays?"

*

It feels like ages before she finds herself back at that truck stop. She'd stopped at the bare little room in central Pennsylvania she calls home, in between being on the road to Illinois and then New Jersey. But she'd planned her hours right, and when she's back it's a Wednesday and she's got almost eight hours left to her break when she sits down at the lunch counter for a meal. A real meal this time, not the endless run of canned soup and peanut butter sandwiches, not protein bars and room temperature juice. Pancakes, the likes of which she'd been dreaming about for around a week, with maple syrup and butter on top. 

John finds her with that stack of pancakes in front of her and a setting sun outside. "Clara," he says, and she finds she likes the way he says her name more than she probably should. "Back so soon?"

"I think it's been nearly a month," she says, but something makes her push her plate towards him before she can think better of it. He's rail-thin under the black hoodie he's wearing, layers adding bulk to a body she's sure has barely even been in the vicinity of a pancake much less consumed one lately. Still, he only hesitates for a moment before taking her fork and going for a healthy bite. 

"'S good," he says.

"Get an omelet, we'll go half and half."

*

He doesn't need to be told twice. With most people he'd have ignored such a request out of sheer spite, and it scares him a touch that he's waving down the waiter and smiling as he asks for the veggie and egg white omelet like it's exactly what he'd come in here for. 

"Where do you call home?" she asks. 

Her half of the omelet is a little bit in the syrup on her plate, and he can't look at that for too long so he looks at her instead and answers, "Nowhere. Company pays a weekly advance, just sort of sleep in the truck when I need to."

She nods. "I've thought about that. Think I like the creature comforts a little too much to ever do it, though."

"It's not for everybody."

Nudging him lightly, she says, "But it's for you, so that's good."

He doesn't have much. A few changes of clothes, an e-reader he'd splurged on so he could have books, an electric razor for when he feels like using it, a little hot pot and a few thermoses. He imagines she probably has a house somewhere, paintings and photos on the walls, trinkets and clutter and a big soft bed--he stops himself and smiles ruefully. "It's a life."

When she doesn't say anything, he picks a bit at his pancakes. Then she asks, "Are you here for long?"

"Yes. I'll be leaving probably around 3 AM. You're right," he says as he turns back to her. "The showers are good here."

"Oh, so you got cleaned up for our little date, did you?" she teases; he stutters something about it not being a date, but he can feel the heat rising up his neck and he smiles and looks away, exhaling sharply and trying to find his footing. "I'm only kidding, John."

"I know," he says quickly. "Sorry."

Clara laughs. "What are you even apologizing for?"

"I don't know." There's something about her when she laughs, a sparkle in her eyes that he can feel himself falling into if he's not careful. So he turns back to his food and closes his eyes, thinking of the steady passage of dashed white lines on black pavement, of a sunrise through a wood-lined highway or waves of heat across a desert. He'd rather fall into that if he can help it. He'd rather get lost in a big country, with no companion but the growl of an engine and the weight of the load he's pulling. 

So maybe it's stupid of him to ask a question that will show him similarities between him and her, maybe it's stupid of him to try and find something that tethers them, but he's never been anything other than an idiot and he asks, "Why do you do it?"

It's a question that catches her off guard, but from how quickly she recovers he knows she's heard it before. There's an almost unreadable look on her face when she looks at him and says, "Because I see wonders."

*

He walks her back to her truck like he's walking her home. It's closer to a home than the room she rents, but he doesn't know that. She'll get a decent amount of sleep, but not before he takes her hand and holds it as she climbs into her truck, not before she turns round to him and says, "Good night, John," like she wishes they weren't parting. 

He looks at her like he's dived deeper than he should have, hyper-focused and dazed all at once. When he starts to walk back to his own truck, hands shoved inside the pockets of his hoodie, she watches him until she catches her reflection in the mirror and sees that she looks exactly the same. In her bunk, she closes her eyes and thinks of the horizon, of stretches of highway with nobody on them but her, the sound of her truck idling as she tries to grab a few minutes' rest during a live load. Mountains with the morning sun reflecting off snow and rock. But her mind goes back to silvered curls and black boots, long fingers and the sense that he might be a little bit the same as her. She thinks it should scare her, but it doesn't.

*

She finds him on CB driving down to Dover. He's near Trenton on 295, heading towards Atlantic City, she's just a little north west of him, and they actually manage to make a plan as she crosses the state line. She'll be deadheading it back after her delivery on her way to another, and they won't have very long together even if all goes according to plan, but she's excited because it's a plan, they've talked and it's been over a month since they've seen each other last. They'd kept it short and professional over the radio, and it hadn't hit her until after just how much she'd missed his voice.

Clara didn't miss things. She'd given up missing things as a teenager, there was no point, missing things or people never brought them back, the energy was better spent elsewhere. And so it had surprised her when, in the silence of her cab, she'd found herself actually missing his voice. 

Of course things didn't really go according to plan. A crash coming back up had kept her an extra fifteen minutes, and by the time she gets to their stop she has to circle around twice to find a parking space. 

She finds him in the diner, same seat as usual, stirring a coffee at the counter. The line of his body is tense, he's all stiff shoulders and deliberate movements. "John?"

He takes a deep breath; there's a mirror behind the counter, but he didn't see her come up, and she's startled him. "Traffic?"

"Stuck on 13 for--" She was about to say, "for ages." It hadn't been ages, it had only felt like it. On a normal day, she'd be angry at having her driving hours cut into, but today, they'd made a plan and she'd been late, and she could tell he'd been worried she wouldn't show. "Let's talk about anything else?"

He sighs with what she hopes is relief as she slides onto the stool next to him. "Is it bad I don't really want to talk?"

His hands are warm from the mug when she takes them in hers. "I don't really either."

*

If anyone was climbing into anyone else's truck, it'd be him into hers, he told her as much, there was no way given how people talk that he was going to let anyone see her coming and going from some raggedy looking older man's rig. So he follows her out, hand in hand, led along through the darkening lot until they got to her cab. But at the door, she says, "John, this isn't--I mean, I don't want to give any false impressions-"

"I just want to sit," he says. "Nothing else. Just sit with some privacy."

The sleeper berth isn't what he'd expected. Neat, yes, but with photos taped up, her as a child smiling with a woman who looked so much like her, a young man in fatigues in what looked like the other side of the world, a woman who might have been her grandmother. A slim blue book of places to visit on the shelf, little sticky notes marking a few of the pages. Not much room to sit on the bed, but he does, and as he looks around him, he asks, "Who are all the pictures of?"

He'd been right about the women, mother and grandmother. The young man was something different, someone special and gone much too soon, and he realized she was more like him than he'd ever thought. "Do you have any?" she asks. "Photos, things like that?"

"No," he says. "Not much use for them." He's hunched over a bit more out of necessity than anything else, but he's not sure he'd sit up and stretch even if he could; he's coiled tight and wants to stay that way, unable to really look at her in her little home she's made here. 

"Well, come on." She pulls him closer to her, then pulls out her phone, and before he knows it, she's taking a picture of the two of them. "What's your number?"

"It's just a regular flip phone," he says. "Doesn't get data."

"Give it to me anyway," she says, so he does. "Next time I see you, I'll give you a real photo, you can put it on your dash."

"I'd like that. I think."

Clara looks at him peculiarly--he hadn't said that in any sort of sarcastic way, but she must have picked up on something in his tone of voice. It was the truth, he would like it, it was just that it meant there was one more connection he couldn't afford, one more person he'd either have to leave or who would leave him. 

She's content putting up photos of those who'd left her. He isn't so sure he wouldn't feel a stab in his heart every time he looked at a photo of them together, once she'd left him. It's then that she kisses him and he isn't so sure he wouldn't feel a stab if he _didn't_ get that photo.

*

She kisses his cheek. 

He's in some kind of headspace she doesn't quite understand, sucked into a pensive state that fills up the tiny berth, and she's determined to cut through it. So she kisses him, and when he blinks at her in shock, she says, "Sorry, you just seemed a million miles away."

His eyes flicker across her face before he bites his thumb, glancing away. "And you wanted me here, did you?"

"I did. Don't have much longer tonight." She kicks off her shoes, motions for him to do the same, then pulls him down to lay next to her. The bed is too small, they're pressed close as they lay on their sides, and even though nothing is going to happen between them, it's the most intimate she's felt with someone in a long time. From the open look on his face, she figures it's the same for him. "Why do you do it?"

"Same as you, I suppose," he says. "You see wonders."

"It's easy to leave them behind, too."

He looks like he wants to escape just then. Her hands find the top of his hoodie, thumbs running up and down the open zipper as she holds the soft cloth in loose fists. "I spent a long time fighting, Clara," he says, "and then a long time running."

His face is so close to hers that she can feel his breath when he talks, and she doesn't need to speak over a whisper. "Do you ever think of stopping?"

John cracks a sad little smile and asks, "Do you?"

She kisses him again. Not ready to stop, not sure if she ever will be, not sure if she can go back to a life where she stays in one place, never leaves her town, sticks around with people who'll just end up going. She'd rather be the one who leaves first. But John's mouth is soft against hers, and when she pulls away and settles against him, his chest is as good a pillow as anything else she's used lately. Her phone already has the alarm set for when she has to leave, so she lets herself drift off against him. "Will you stay?"

"I have to leave in a bit." His arms are around her and his hand is stroking her back, so she believes him when he says, "I'm sorry."

"I can call you?"

"Yes." She's half between wakefulness and sleep when she feels him kiss her forehead. "I have to go. I'll see you, Clara."

She squeezes her eyes even more shut and then opens them to look up at him, unable to let go of his hand. "You'll see me? And when will that be?"

With a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, he says, "When I see you."

When he leaves, he lets in a blast of chilly air, but it's nothing she can't handle. In a week, a new photo goes up on her wall, and she thinks about calling to let him know when she'll be back at that stop next, Wednesday or no. 

She drives instead. She'll see him when she sees him, and between now and then, she's got thousands of miles to go.


End file.
